Yuri Kramar, Kiev. Exclusively to Vestnik Kavkaza
On May 13th the acting Premier of Ukraine, Arseny Yatsenyuk, made several bold statements on Russian-Ukrainian gas relations. First of all, he announced an ultimatum to Moscow on reconsideration of the contract between Kiev and Gazprom, according to which Ukraine has to pay almost $500 per thousand cubic meters of gas, in 20 days. Otherwise, Yatsenyuk warns that he will sue Russia at the Stockholm Arbitration tribunal.
Secondly, he expressed optimistic assurance that the Ukrainian gas pipeline will get a second wind, as both the EU and the USA will begin to reconstruct it. And how! Ukraine plans to ratify “the third energy package”, aimed at worsening Gazprom’s life and forbidding it not only gas exports, but also gas sales to final consumers. It seems some Ukrainian and Western politicians think that after such a “present” the Russian gas company will start to sell its production to Ukraine intensively and at a low price, forgetting about the huge debts.
Meanwhile, Ukraine paid no attention to an interview given to Der Standard on May 9th by Günther Oettinger, European Commissioner for Energy, who stated that he has no crucial objections against the South Stream Project. “The pipeline is not a problem for us; we don’t plan to ban it, even though it is not a priority. The main thing is that the project would meet European legislation.” According to the Commissioner, “the issue on construction of South Stream is still open.”
Recently the EU’s rhetoric on South Stream has been much stricter. It was almost about arm-twisting of the governments and gas traders of the countries through which the pipeline had to pass, demanding freezing of construction. The projected capacity of the pipeline is 75 billion cubic meters annually, while in the first four months of 2014 only 23.28 billion cubic meters passed through the GTS of Ukraine to the West. So South Stream is able to deprive Ukrainian pipelines of transit capacity.
Why did Europe change its position from previous threats of sanctions against Russia, including gas pipeline sanctions?
To be continued
